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Biodiversity in the Honey Bee Haven
When the half-acre Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven is implemented by the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility at UC Davis later this year, honey bees won't be the only ones enjoying the garden.
Expect to see butterflies, bumblebees and other insects.
Remember the project? Last December Häagen-Dazs ice cream committed $125,000 to the UC Davis Department of Entomology for the bee haven. A Sausalito team-- landscape architects Donald Sibbett and Ann F. Baker, interpretative planner Jessica Brainard and exhibit designer Chika Kurotaki--won the design competition, which drew 30 entries. One was submitted from as far away as England.
The key goals of the garden are to provide bees with a year-around food source, to raise public awareness about the plight of honey bees and to encourage visitors to plant bee-friendly gardens of their own.
We’re all eagerly looking forward to the garden, which will be dedicated in October.
Meanwhile, scientists at the Laidlaw facility plan to examine the diversity of insects already there. One insect we saw there last week was a soapberry bug on a flowering almond tree.
So bees, butterflies, bumblebees and soapberry bugs.
Among others.
Lots of others.
Soapberry bug
Twenty-Nine Days to Go
Twenty-nine days to go.
If you love bees and know how to design a bee friendly garden, remember Jan. 30.
Jan. 30 is the deadline to submit your design for the half-acre bee friendly garden at the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility, UC Davis. The nationwide competition is funded by Häagen-Dazs.
This will be a pollinator paradise that will meet the nutritional needs of honey bees and serve as a living laboratory.
"It will provide a much needed, year-around food source for our bees," said Lynn Kimsey, chair of the Department of Entomology and director of the Bohart Museum of Entomology. "We anticipate it also will be a gathering place to inform and educate the public about bees."
The UC Davis Department of Entomology Web site lists the rules, the prizes, and provides a list of bee-favorite flowering plants. Plans call for "something" to be blooming throughout the year.
The long list of flowering plants includes sages, toyon, catmint and lavender.
To that I'd add the rock purslane (Calandrinia grandiflora). In our own bee friendly garden, that's a favorite of the bees. And guess what? It's blooming right now, in the dead of winter. Ray Lopez, owner of El Rancho Nursery, Vacaville (where we bought the plant), says it blooms throughout the year in California.
We haven't seen the bees lately, but the rock purslane is waiting for them.
Rock Purslane
Close-up of Bee
Pollinator Paradise
There's been trouble in paradise far too long.
Now, thanks to a generous donation from Häagen-Dazs, there will be a pollinator paradise--in the way of a bee friendly garden--at the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility at UC Davis.
Häagen-Dazs announced this week it will donate $125,000 to the UC Davis Department of Entomology to launch a nationwide design competition to create a one-half acre honey bee haven garden on Bee Biology Road. Häagen-Dazs has commited $65,000 of the $125,000 to establish the garden.
"The honey bee haven will be a pollinator paradise," said Lynn Kimsey, chair of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and director of the Bohart Museum of Entomology. "It will provide a much needed, year-round food source for our bees at the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility. We anticipate it also will be a gathering place to inform and educate the public about bees. We are grateful to Haagen-Dazs for its continued efforts to ensure bee health."
And you are invited to design it. The nationwide contest is open to anyone who can design a garden, using basic landscape principles. The rules, a list of bee friendly plants, design examples and other information is on the UC Davis Department of Entomology Web site.
Häagen-Dazs is funding the design competition and the
"The garden will be extremely helpful in demonstrating that bees are not a nuisance in the backyard, but instead are obtaining food and water essential for their survival," Eric Mussen, a Cooperative Extension apiculturist and a 32-year member of the UC Davis Department of Entomology faculty, told us.
"Campus visitors," he said. "will be able to see which flowers are most attractive to foraging honey bees and how to space the flowers in order to have bees flying in the most convenient areas of their gardens.”
The deadline to submit a design is Jan. 30, 2009. Mail your design to the
More information on the design competition is available from Melissa Borel, program manager at UC Davis'
You should also check out the Häagen-Dazs educational Web site at http://www.helpthehoneybees.com. In February they commited a total of $250,000 in honey bee research to UC Davis and Pennsylvania State. And now: another way to help the honey bees.
The design competition winner will receive recognition on the Häagen-Dazs commemorative plaque at the entrance to the garden. Another gift will be a year's supply of Häagen-Dazs ice cream.
Honey bee on sage
